This year, I wont be feeling mentally unstable, I wont be horrid to anyone and I will laugh.
last year I made a woman feel uncomfortable she was not a great friend just a nosy person trying to say the right things but I was hurting and feeling mean I wanted to lash out at someone and there she was my victim.
A lot has happened between last year and this. The first big change I have completed my Masters degree, I have just secured a fantastic internship with a leading production company and I write for a great online newspaper.
One of the things I wanted to do in tribute for my lovely funny, dimples in cheek son was to better myself. I think I have succeeded.
So come on I think to myself, come on don’t be horrible, don’t be TOO sad, don’t make people feel uncomfortable it’s not their fault, in fact Delores if you don’t know them don’t talk about it.
My real friends and Richie’s friends understand,and I understand them. He was not an angel, he was not perfect, he was naughty, he made me laugh out loud, I wanted to strangle him (ironic).
We used to have a game called Jabba the Hut, the first person to say “Jabba the Hut wants his arse back when you’ve finished using it as your face” was the winner and we would laugh hysterically trying to get the words out before the other.
I remember us doing it in the hospital where he was being treated for cancer, I straddled him and held his arms down whilst screaming it in his face, we couldn’t stop laughing.
For a long time I used to stand at my front room window and wish with all my heart that this was just a bad dream, I would close my eyes and count to 100 and pray with all my heart that when I opened my eyes he would be standing there. I really meant it. I promised that I would not be angry with him for going away for so long and we would start all over again. The disappointment was horrendous he never was there. I believed in magic, but it didn’t believe in me.
He did not die of cancer, he was killed in a medical accident at Great Ormond Street Hospital. Jon lee Richie’s doctor on the day, had never done chemotherapy before and did not know what he was doing, he injected the deadly poison and chemotherapy drug Vincristine into Richie’s spine. It should have gone into his arm. It killed him. I forgave Jon Lee, but I didn’t like him and still don’t, but I had to forgive or I would have gone mad.
The only thing that annoys me still is the fact that we have moved on and his sister that he was close to has a family of her own and he would have been delighted, he would have been a fantastic uncle.
I take consolation that Richie’s case is used all over the world to highlight negligence and care in medicine and a new needle was invented so the drug Vincristine can’t be injected straight into the spine.
Here are few of there comments that Richie’s friends left on a picture of him on facebook
These are a few other young boys and in the montage woman who have been killed and lost to their parents, I want to remember them as well. The young man in uniform is called Anthony Walker who was murdered in a brutal fashion on the day before the anniversary of Richies death, in a way it helped me because I couldn’t stop thinking of Anthonys mother and family who suffer. I hope they are all friends in heaven and looking out for their mothers and fathers smoothing our tears away and sending us love
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